Esperanto speakers? You‚Äôre probably thinking there can‚Äôt be many of them ‚Äď and moreover that the few who do exist are probably crazy as well. Yes, you‚Äôre right that they are far fewer in number than the people who are learning English or, these days, Chinese. But how many are there? The truth is that nobody knows. If the figure of ‚Äúmore than 100,000‚ÄĚ is good enough for Encyclopaedia Britannica, far be it from me to contradict it by giving my own estimate.

In any case, we can confidently say that there are a few million Esperanto speakers scattered throughout the world. If there weren‚Äôt, the Esperanto Wikipedia would not now be the 32nd largest in terms of the number of articles (as recorded in June 2016). Not to mention the 1.6 million learners who have signed up for the Esperanto courses with the language-learning site Duolingo.

Esperanto speakers are everywhere. The World Esperanto Association has members in over 120 countries. Esperanto speakers can also be found in the sort of places where you would never think of looking, such as East Timor and New Caledonia, and there are fascinating stories about the development of Esperanto in various countries, from China to the Czech Republic. The British Library‚Äôs Esperanto Collections reflect the history and diversity of the Esperanto movement and its publications.

Books from the British Library Esperanto Collection on the Esperanto movement in different countries and regions

Zamenhof, the creator of Esperanto, belonged to those 19th-century visionaries who dreamt of universal brotherhood, peace and understanding. But during the very first World Congress in Boulogne-sur-Mer in France in 1905, a more practical group came to the fore, asserting that Esperanto was just a language, a means of facilitating international communication, and had nothing to do with airy-fairy dreams of a better world.

These are not the only divisions among Esperanto speakers. There are those who are working for it to become the world‚Äôs universal second language, and those who are happy for it to remain a niche interest and prefer to concentrate on developing its cultural potential. This second approach has a name: RaŇ≠mismo, the Rauma movement, after the Finnish town where the World Esperanto Youth Congress was held in 1980.

As a world-wide phenomenon the Esperanto community is exposed to many influences. During the last century numerous special-interest groups were founded, contributing to a truly colourful panorama. One of the earliest was the International Union of Catholic Esperantists. But unsurprisingly the Catholics were followed by the Protestants, then by the Orthodox Christians, to say nothing of Buddhists, ŇĆmoto (a Japanese religion), Muslims, Bah√°‚Äô√≠ and Mormons. Naturally, in response to all this religious activity the atheists could not fail to put in an appearance ‚Äď but oddly enough, there is no Jewish association at the moment, although there is no lack of Jews in the movement as a whole. All these diverse groups have found common ground between the Esperanto movement and their own ideals.

Afterwards came the Communist Esperanto speakers, the Socialists, Anarchists and other splinter groups who even fought in the Spanish Civil War, but now are more likely to fight amongst themselves. At the same time professional associations came into being, who used Esperanto as their working language and published specialist periodicals. You may be surprised to learn that there are doctors who discuss surgery in Esperanto.

Cover of Medicina Internacia Revuo. (July 1974) 5533.51000

Then there are the railway workers, the journalists, the ecologists, the feminists and numerous others. Teachers are particularly important in a movement whose aim is to teach a language. Their association is the International League of Esperantist Teachers.

You might well ask yourself what all these diverse groups have in common. In fact, there is something.

The first general trait is being interested in ‚Äúthe other‚ÄĚ. Esperanto was born with the aim of facilitating communication between people speaking different languages, and so curiosity about other cultures is part of its DNA.

Books of interviews with Esperantists wordwide about their reasons for learning Esperanto

The second trait is tolerance. No one cares if you support some cranky fringe movement; you will be accepted anyway. The Esperanto-speaking world is open to groups who may be subject to some rather odd looks in the rest of society. Nobody in the UK now finds anything remarkable about being a vegetarian, but that was not the case as recently as the 1960s. The British Esperanto movement contains a higher proportion of vegetarians than society as a whole, as was shown in Peter G. Forster‚Äôs study The Esperanto Movement (The Hague, 1982; X.0900/323(32)). Homosexuals were welcome in the Esperanto movement at a time when homosexuality was still a crime in many countries.

In the 130 years since the first book in Esperanto was published, Esperanto speakers have been creating their own culture of novels, poetry, songs and jokes. Hundreds of thousands of books have been published, both translated and original. Many Esperanto authors are known for their writing in their own languages as well as Esperanto, for instance the British writer Marjorie Boulton.

Literary serial Beletra almanako (New York, 2006-). ZF.9.a.7847

Musicians singing in Esperanto can be heard online (e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27BP5sXwuTs), and many of the thousands who have started learning with Duolingo create videos for YouTube. You will also find many Esperantists on social media platforms.

Kajto (Ankie van der Meer and Nanne Kalma from Netherlands) singing at the London Esperanto Club (Photo by Olga Kerziouk).

And finally, the last trait that all Esperanto speakers share, whatever their backgrounds or beliefs, is their love for the language itself and for the Esperanto-speaking community. For many couples Esperanto has even become their family language, particularly when they belong to different nationalities. They chat in Esperanto over the dinner table and use it to talk to their children.

Renato Corsetti, Professor Emeritus of Psycholinguistics at La Sapienza University in Rome, General Secretary of the Academy of Esperanto / Anna Lowenstein, Esperanto author and journalist

Further reading

Esperanto in the New York Times: 1887-1922, edited by Ulrich Becker. (New York, 2010).YD.2010.a.12499

Roberto GarviŐĀa Soto. Esperanto and its rivals: the struggle for an international language. (Philadelphia, 2015) m15/.11262

Esther H. Schor, Bridge of words: Esperanto and the dream of a universal language (New York, 2015). Waiting for shelfmark.

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J.R.R. Tolkien had a ‚Äėsecret vice‚Äô, which ceased to be secret from the moment he let the cat out of the bag in an essay of the same title, which has been reprinted many times.

Tolkien‚Äôs vice was inventing languages. He was introduced to this pleasure at an early age by his cousins Mary and Marjorie Incledon, who taught him the language Animalic which they had created themselves. He quotes a fragment of it in his 1936 essay ‚ÄėThe Monsters and the Critics‚Äô: ‚ÄúDog nightingale woodpecker forty = You are an ass‚ÄĚ.

When the elder of the two girls lost interest, Tolkien, who was already learning Latin and French at school, collaborated with her younger sister to create a second and more sophisticated language called Nevbosh or ‚ÄėNew Nonsense‚Äô. ‚ÄúI was a member of the Nevbosh-speaking world,‚ÄĚ Tolkien proudly recalls. He even quotes part of a poem in the language, which begins with the lines: Dar fys ma vel gom co palt ‚Äėhoc / Pys go iskili far maino woc? (There was an old man who said ‚Äėhow / can I possibly carry my cow?‚Äô)

During this time Tolkien also learnt Esperanto. Esperanto was still a new language, only five years older than Tolkien himself. (The first book of Esperanto was published in 1887, while Tolkien was born in 1892.) When he was 17 years old he used Esperanto in a manuscript with the title The Book of the Foxrook, consisting of 16 pages in a a secret code using rune-like phonetic symbols and ideograms. The name of the code was Privata Kodo SkaŇ≠ta ‚Äď ‚ÄėPrivate Scout Code‚Äô (The correct word for ‚Äėscout‚Äô in modern Esperanto is skolta.)

A teenager with a passion for learning and creating languages could hardly fail to discover Esperanto, although the criteria which Tolkien followed for his own constructed languages were quite different from those which inspired Esperanto‚Äôs creator Zamenhof. The grammar of Esperanto aims to be as simple as possible, in contrast to the complex grammars of Tolkien‚Äôs languages. Tolkien was aiming to create word forms which would be aesthetically pleasing, and harmonize with their meanings. In accordance with these principles he invented at least 15 languages in the course of his lifetime. He also gave them different dialects and background histories showing how they had evolved over time, and imagined the peoples who spoke them His grammars were very elaborate, making use of his linguistic knowledge of Finnish, Welsh, Ancient Greek and other languages. It might be difficult to learn to speak his languages fluently ‚Äď but ease of learning was never his primary object in creating them.

A selection of books about Tolkien‚Äôs invented languages from the British Library‚Äôs collections

In the first period up to 1930 he worked on Primitive Quendian, from which the entire family of Elvish languages evolved. He followed this up with Common Eldarin, Quenya and Goldorin, which later became Noldorin. To these languages he later added Telerin, Ilkorin, Doriathrin and Avarin.

In the final stage, Noldorin evolved into Sindarin, which along with Quenya is one of his best known languages. Sindarin makes use of the same phonological system as Welsh, which was one of Tolkien‚Äôs favourite languages. The grammar is also inspired by Welsh, and the result is notably complex. For example some nouns form the plural with an ending (usually -in), e.g. Dr√Ľ, pl. Dr√ļin, ‚Äėwild men‚Äô. Others do so through vowel change, e.g. golodh and gelydh, ‚Äėlore master, sage.. Still others use some combination of the two, and a few do not change in the plural: Belair, ‚ÄėBeleriandic-Elf/Elves‚Äô is singular and plural.

An example of Tolkien‚Äôs Quenya script and language (Image by TigerTj√§der from Wikimedia Commons)

Compare this with Esperanto, which has only one plural ending for nouns, with no exceptions. Of course, the aim of Esperanto is that it should be easy to learn for speakers of all languages.

In spite of this, Tolkien recognized the poetic qualities of Esperanto, stating in ‚ÄėA Secret Vice‚Äô: ‚ÄúAlso I particularly like Esperanto, not least because it is the creation ultimately of one man, not a philologist, and is therefore something like a ‚Äėhuman language bereft of the inconveniences due to too many successive cooks[...];‚ÄĚ .

At the phonological level, too, Tolkien‚Äôs languages stand in complete contrast to the simplicity of Esperanto. Sindarin is based on Welsh, but with elements of Old English and Old Icelandic, resulting in a rich abundance of vowels and consonants. Esperanto‚Äôs phonological system on the other hand is closer to that of Modern Hebrew, which consists of a simplified version of the phonology of European languages.

Tolkien‚Äôs connection with the British Esperanto movement continued in later years. In 1930 the World Esperanto Congress was held in Oxford, and the following year Tolkien was appointed to the Board of Honorary Advisers of the British Esperanto Association‚Äôs Education Committee.

Letter from Tolkien to the Secretary of the Committee of the British Esperanto Association, printed in The British Esperantist, 2 May 1932. PP.4939.ka.

In his letter of acceptance, Tolkien wrote that Esperanto was ‚Äúin the position of an orthodox church facing not only unbelievers but schismatics and heretics.‚ÄĚ The letter concludes with the well-known sentence: ‚ÄúMy advice to all who have the time or inclination to concern themselves with the international language movement would be: ‚ÄėBack Esperanto loyally.‚Äô‚ÄĚ

In 1933 he was one of the patrons of the British Esperanto Congress in Oxford, and signed a declaration about the educational value of Esperanto in schools.

Two of Tolkien‚Äôs most popular works have been translated into Esperanto. The Lord of the Rings was translated by the major Esperanto writer and poet William Auld (1924-2006) as La mastro de l‚Äô ringoj (first published 1995-1997). The Hobbit was first published in Esperanto in 2000 as La hobito: aŇ≠ tien kaj reen, translated by Christopher Gledhill and William Auld.

La Hobito: auŐÜ tien kaj reen (Ekaterinburg,2000). YF.2008.a.10159

Tolkien‚Äôs writings show that for him one of the most important qualities of invented languages was beauty of form. Sindarin achieves that ideal, possessing both educational and aesthetic value. Remembering his support for Esperanto, Esperanto speakers owe it to him to declare, ‚Äúńúuu Sindarin plene‚ÄĚ - Enjoy Sindarin to the full.

Renato Corsetti, Professor Emeritus of Psycholinguistics, La Sapienza University Rome, and former President of the World Esperanto Association.

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The new international language Esperanto had not yet reached its 20th birthday when the first anthology of national literature in it was published in 1905. Not surprisingly it was a Polish anthology (Pola antologio). The British Library holds the second edition of it, published in 1909 in Paris by the famous Librarie Hachette.

Cover of Pola Antologio (Paris, 1909). F5/3997]

The choice of items and translations themselves were made by Polish Esperanto pioneer Kazimierz Bein, known amongst Esperantists worldwide under his pseudonym Kabe. This edition consisted from prose works of 14 prominent Polish writers (Henryk Sienkiewicz, WŇāadysŇāaw Reymont, Eliza Orzeszko, Maria Konopnicka and others). Some of his translations from Polish, Russian and German were republished in later years while the translator himself lost interest in Esperanto and left the movement, leaving after himself the verb kabei (meaning ‚Äúto disappear suddenly after being active‚ÄĚ).

The compilation, translation and publication of treasures of native culture became a task of honour for Esperantists of all countries. Other anthologies followed after the First World War: Catalan (YF.2005.a.5977) and Bulgarian (012264.aaa.12) in 1925, Belgian (Belga antologio) in 1928, Estonian (YF.2006.b.2354) in 1932, Hungarian (Hungara antologio; on order) in 1933, Swedish in 2 volumes (ZF.9.a.6406) in 1934, Czechoslovak (YF.2017.a.1323) in 1935, Swiss (YF.2006.a.30968) in 1939.

Cover of Estona Antologio (Tallinn, 1932). YF.2006.b.2354

The best Esperanto poets and writers contributed to the translations of many of them. A very good example is the volume of Hungara Antologio, the first edition of which appeared in 1933. It has 473 pages and features 50 Hungarian authors. Famous Esperantists, well-known for their own original works, engaged in the programme of translation: K√°lm√°n Kalocsay), Julio Baghy, Lajos T√°rkony and others. Another edition, with some new authors added, was published 50 years later, in 1983 (YF.2008.a.21429), by Vilmos Benczik.

Persecution of Esperantists by Nazi and Stalinist regimes and the Second World War stopped activities and publishing once again. Only in 1950s the publishing restarted: an English anthology (Angla antologio 1000-1800; X22/0305) was published in 1957 (but the second volume Angla antologio II: 1800-1960 appeared 30 years later, in 1987; YC.1990.a.4395). More anthologies followed in the 1980s: Macedonian (YF.2010.a.21783) in 1981, German (YF.2006.a.31533) in 1985, Italian ( YF.2006.a.9512) in 1987, Australian (YF.2008.a.19828) in 1988.

Covers of Itala Antologio (1987) and Germana antologio (1985)

Some anthologies have lovely illustrations, made especially for Esperanto editions, as for example ńąina Antologio(1919-1949).

From: ńąina Antologio (Pekino, 1986). YF.2017.a.1307

In the 1990s more anthologies were published: Romanian (YF.2006.a.31163) in 1990, French (Franca antologio) and Occitan (Okcitana antologio) in 1998. There are now almost 100 anthologies, some of them limited to certain period or genre (as Antologio de portugalaj rakontoj; X25/4091 or Nederlanda antologio. Antologio de Nederlanda poezio post la mezepoko; YF.2008.a.29548) or language (Latina antologio; ZF.9.a.6591) or even region (PodlahŐāia Antologio; 2009; YF.2010.a.1053)

When some journalists still wonder about the survival of Esperanto teams of Esperanto translators are working compiling and translating new anthologies or planning new editions of old ones. The British Library holds many of the anthologies which can show to unprejudiced researcher the richness of the so-called ‚Äúartificial language‚ÄĚ in which all treasures of humankind can be rendered by gifted translators.

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After some initial doubts by the Tzarist censors, the first decade of the 20th century was a period of good relations between Esperanto speakers and the Russian authorities. There were courses and clubs throughout the country. Every year until 1914 an official government representative took part in national Esperanto congresses with the support of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce.

When the Russian Revolution broke out, many Esperantists gave it their enthusiastic support. At the same time, they continued promoting the language. Chief among these was an energetic and ambitious young man, Ernest Drezen, who managed to convince the new regime that Esperanto would be an essential tool to enable the world‚Äôs proletariat to communicate during the expected proletarian revolution. The Esperanto movement received support from the Soviet authorities at the highest level, which enabled it to develop in a most satisfactory manner.

Cover of Rusia revolucio de 1917 (Moscow, 1989) YF.2015.a.8476, a graphic novel about the Revolution in Esperanto

It is important not to underestimate the idealism of the early years, which bore fruit in the fields of language and culture among others. Internally there was a policy of encouraging the use of all the languages of the national minorities, while an important foreign policy aim was the creation of a global proletarian culture. Esperanto fitted naturally into this aspiration for greater internationalism.

Early in 1919 the Bolshevik government made a major contribution to the work of the Esperanto movement. The periodical Esperanto Triumfonta (‚ÄėEsperanto will triumph‚Äô) reported on this the following year (1920, issue 6):

Moscow: According to the official Communist newspaper ‚ÄėIzvestija‚Äô of 16th and 17th January 1919, the Communist government has made a large house available to the Moscow Esperantists.... It will be home to the Moscow Esperanto Society and the Organizing Committee of the Russian Esperanto Federation.... There will also be a bookshop and a large library, a reading room and a meeting room for the club. There are two publications: ‚ÄėOficiala Bulteno‚Äô and ‚ÄėJuna Mondo‚Äô (Official Bulletin and Young World).

Drezen knew that any Esperanto association would have to conform to the Bolshevik party line. After various attempts, in 1921 he founded the Sovetrespublikara Esperantista Unio (SEU: Soviet Republics‚Äô Esperantist Union), whose constitution followed the organizing principles of the Bolshevik Party.

Cover of: L. Sosnovski, Kvinjaro de Sovetlandoj (Moscow, 1923) Above. Below: Portrait of Leon Trotsky from the same book with title-page as Jarkvino de la Oktobra Revolucio. F13/1021

Numerous young Esperantists joined the new association, among them many talented people: organizers, journalists, writers, poets. SEU quickly became a strong, healthy and active Esperantist collective with a large membership. To continue receiving state support however it had to publicly cease all relations with the World Esperanto Association (UEA), seen as ‚Äėa ‚Äúneutral‚ÄĚ petit-bourgeois organization in solidarity with the League of Nations‚Äô and therefore not permitted to have members or representatives in the Soviet Republic. This was one of the points approved during SEU‚Äôs first congress. Instead, SEU chose to work with the Sennacieca Asocio Tutmonda (SAT: World Non-national Association), which was founded as a non-neutral proletarian Esperantist organization during the same period. SEU recommended that all its members should also join SAT.

Cover of : Eugeno Mihalski, Prologo, (Leipzig, 1929). YF.2012.a.27401

Cooperation between SEU and SAT was initially active and fruitful, but in 1923 there were the first signs of disagreement about the aims and direction of Esperanto activities, when SAT‚Äôs executive did not approve some of the decisions made during SEU‚Äôs congress. Even so relations remained good, culminating in SAT‚Äôs 6th Congress in Leningrad in 1926.

In the meantime the political climate in the Soviet Union was changing. The idea of a world proletarian revolution had fallen out of favour. Stalin, the new leader, believed it was possible to build a Socialist society in a single country. Anyone who disagreed was labelled ‚Äėan enemy of the people‚Äô and punished in accordance with the new criminal code, which came into force in 1926. One Esperanto speaker, Aleksandr Postnikov, had already been executed by firing squad the previous year. He was an army officer, and one of the most active Esperantists in the early 1900s. He was arrested several times, condemned for spying, and only rehabilitated in 1993.

Many groups came under suspicion. In 1936 it was the turn of the Esperantists. There were mass arrests in Ukraine. Torture was widely used to force confessions from innocent people about ‚Äėcounter-revolutionary activity‚Äô, and the leaders of the Soviet Esperanto movement were made to sign confessions about their participation in the ‚ÄėTrotskyite‚Äô organizations SEU and SAT, as well as spying, and even plotting to liquidate the Soviet leadership. The Ministry of the Interior began to arrest Esperantists across the country, because almost all of them were members of SEU and SAT.

Trials against Esperanto speakers continued until 1938. Hundreds of rank-and-file members of the two associations were given long sentences of exile, while the leaders of the movement, including Ernest Drezen and the major poet and writer Eugene Michalski were shot. Vladimir Varankin, a novelist and professor of history and foreign languages, was accused of spying and plotting to murder Stalin, and was killed.

SEU had never been officially prohibited. Now it ceased to exist, and the national Esperanto movement was extinguished for almost 20 years.

Were Esperanto speakers really so dangerous for the state? Hardly. But their contacts with foreign Esperantists, which allowed them to send and receive ‚Äėundesirable‚Äô information, were deemed dangerous. They receive an ironic mention in the second chapter of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn‚Äôs work The Gulag Archipelago: ‚ÄėAmong those great waves, certain modest little wavelets were also swept away, including [...] the Esperantists (a harmful group which Stalin undertook to smoke out during the years when Hitler was doing the same thing).‚Äô

So Esperanto had its triumph during the first idealistic years of the Russian Revolution and its tragedy in the years before the Second World War. But after Stalin‚Äôs death it revived, and played a remarkable role during the Cold War, when it was one of the channels for communicating with the West.

Recent monographs about Esperanto movement in the Russian empire and USSR published in Russia.

Moisej Bronshtejn, Russian writer and journalist.Renato Corsetti, Professor Emeritus of Psycholinguistics at La Sapienza University in Rome, former president of the World Esperanto Association.

The British Library‚Äôs exhibitionRussian Revolution: Hope, Tragedy, Mythsis open until 29 August 2017, telling the extraordinary story of the Russian Revolution from the reign of Russia‚Äôs last Tsar to the rise of the first communist state. You can also read articles from our experts exploring some of the themes of our exhibition on our Russian Revolution website.

Linguists are undecided about Esperanto: is it closer to the Asian or the European languages? Its vocabulary is certainly more European, but its structure is similar to that of some Asian languages. In any case, Esperanto started to be known in Asia at almost the same time that it appeared in Europe.

The first mention of Esperanto in Japan was in the late 1880s in relation to a brief flurry of interest in another artificial language, Volap√ľk. It really arrived in 1906 in the wake of the Russo-Japanese War. A body of learners, advocates, and users emerged which was notably diverse right from the outset. A sample of some of the early participants serves to illustrate this: Futabatei Shimei, the Russophile and novelist, encountered Esperanto in Vladivostok. His textbook, translated from Russian, was one of the most popular of the early ways to learn. Osugi Sakae, one of the most significant Japanese anarchists, was in prison in 1906 when the first Esperanto meetings were being held, but while there he began to study the language and on release was a very active participant, writing the first Japanese to Esperanto translation, setting up an Esperanto night school, and introducing the language to a number of expatriate Chinese students who went on to form the foundation of the Esperanto (and Anarchist) movement in China.

In 1907 a Chinese-language magazine was published in Paris with the title Hinshi-gi (New Century), in which anarchist Chinese students called for Esperanto to come into general use in China. The first Esperanto courses in China began in 1906 in Shanghai.

Five issues of Orienta Azio in the British Library's collection. Hand written, hand-bound, printed on Washi paper. (Tokyo, 1913-1914). YF.2016.a.7793

And then there was Ho Chi Minh, a young revolutionary who was travelling the world. In 1915 he was living in Crouch End, London, and he learned Esperanto at around this time. He would go on to make use of it in 1945 when the Vietnamese radio service informed the world of the state‚Äôs declaration of independence.

Esperanto was introduced into Korea by students who had learnt it in Japan. However, it would take too long to describe Esperanto‚Äôs fortunes in every country in Asia.

Just after the First World War, one of Esperanto‚Äôs early heroes was the Japanese Nitobe Inazo. When the League of Nations was established in 1920, Nitobe became one of the Under-Secretaries General of the League. He became a founding director of the International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation (which later became UNESCO).

Title page of: Nitobe Inazo. From Bushido to the League of Nations. Edited by Teruhika Nagao (Sapporo, 2006) YD.2006.a.3871

In August 1921, Nitobe took part in the 13th World Congress of Esperanto in Prague as the official delegate of the League of Nations. His report to the General Assembly of the League was the first objective report on Esperanto by a high-ranking official representative of an intergovernmental organization. Although the proposal for the League to accept Esperanto as their working language was accepted by ten delegates, mainly from Asian countries, the French delegate used his power of veto to block the issue.

In honour of Nitobe, a regular feature of World Esperanto Congresses over the last twenty years has been the Nitobe Symposium, in which well-known linguists discuss global language problems.

Esperanto also prospered in China during the same period. Among its supporters was the famous writer Lu Xun. The Chinese Esperanto movement soon became linked to other progressive cultural movements, and the language was learned by numerous intellectuals and revolutionaries.

Esperanto speakers accompanied Mao Zedong on the Long March, and after visiting an exhibition about Esperanto, Mao wrote, ‚ÄúIf Esperanto is used as a means for presenting ideas which are truly internationalist and truly revolutionary, then Esperanto can and should be studied.‚ÄĚ Mao‚Äôs comment opened the way for Esperanto in China.

In the meantime Esperanto had found adepts in most other Asian countries. Some phenomena are difficult to explain. Iran is one of the Asian countries where the movement has done well from the early 20th century onwards throughout all political upheavals and revolutions. Both the Shah and the Ayatollahs approved its use, and the national movement celebrated its centenary in 2016. And what about Pakistan? The national Esperanto association formally joined the World Esperanto Association in 1978, and continues to hold conferences and publish textbooks in Urdu. For more detailed information about the movement in other Asian countries the best source is Gvidlibro pri Esperanto-movado en Azio (Guidbook to the Esperanto movement in Asia) by Chieko Doi (Yokohama, 1995; YF.2009.a.6158; Cover below).

There is no country in Asia without its Esperanto speakers, from Mongolia to Myanmar, including Kazakhstan, Indonesia, the Philippines and others. An Asian congress of Esperanto takes place every three years. The 8th Asian Congress took place in the Chinese city of Quanzhou in November 2016 with participants from 20 countries. The 9th Congress will be in the Vietnamese city of Da-Nang in 2019. In addition, the Chinese and Japanese are the most prolific publishers of books in Esperanto. The Chinese Esperanto magazine El Popola ńąinio (From People‚Äôs China; ZF.9.a.6337) is produced by the Foreign Languages Press in Beijing which has also published almost 200 books in Esperanto. China Radio International broadcasts regularly in Esperanto and recently has also started producing films for distribution on the Internet.

Books for children published in China and South Korea, from Esperanto Collections of the British Library.

Considering the strength of the Esperanto movement in Asia, on the day when the 102nd World Esperanto Congress is opening in Seoul we can certainly claim that Esperanto is as much an Asian as a European language.

Renato Corsetti, Professor Emeritus of Psycholinguistics at La Sapienza University in Rome, former president of the World Esperanto Association.Inumaru Fumio, Vice President of the Commission for the Asian Esperanto Movement of the World Esperanto Association.

L. L.Zamenhof, creator of Esperanto, died in Warsaw on 14 April 1917. Warsaw was at this time occupied by German troops as the war in Europe still raged and the Russian empire was already engulfed in the flames by the February Revolution.

‚ÄúNormally the funeral of Ludovic Zamenhof would have been attended by at least representatives of the Esperanto Movement from most European countries; war made this impossible‚ÄĚ, notes Marjorie Boulton in her book Zamenhof, Creator of Esperanto.

At three o‚Äôclock on April 16th the funeral procession set out from 41 Krolewska Street, with those members of the family who were able to come, the Warsaw Esperantists and many of Zamenhof‚Äôs poor patients. Foreign Esperantists were represented by Major Neubarth and one other German. As slow procession passed through the Saxon Square and along Wierzbowa Street, Bielanska Street, Nalewki Street, Dzika Street and Gesia Street to Okopowa Street and the Jewish cemetery, the slow black serpent grew longer and longer.

At the funeral Polish poet and Esperantist Leo Belmont spoke warmly about Zamenhof in Polish and the president of the Polish Esperanto Society, poet and translator Antoni Grabowski paid tribute to the great man in Esperanto.

The news about the death of Zamenhof spread worldwide. In the memorial service in London at Harecourt Church on 6 May 1917, Belgian Esperantist Paul Blaise, married to British Esperantist Margaret Jones and living in England as a refugee, read from the yet unpublished translation of Isaiah by Zamenhof himself.

The British Esperantist. Issue for May 1917. Announcement of Zamenhof‚Äôs death. P.P.4939ka.

The most famous poem about the death of Zamenhof ‚ÄėLa Majstro mortis‚Äô (The Master is Dead) was written by the Hungarian Esperantist, professional actor and writer Julio Baghy, then a prisoner of war in Siberia.

The extraordinary life of Zamenhof, his language and his ideas attracted and will attract a lot of attention now and in the future. In 2007 the sixth edition of the biography of Zamenhof (first published in 1920) by prominent Swiss Esperantist Edmond Privat was published by the Universal Esperanto Association, based in Rotterdam. On this day, 100 years after the death of Zamenhof, Esperantists from Albania to Zimbabwe and many non-Esperantists remember his life and achievements. Zamenhof‚Äôs testament from his poem ‚ÄėLa Vojo‚Äô (‚ÄėThe Way‚Äô), written in 1896, is still echoing in their memories:

Straight forward, with courage, not veering nor stoppingPursue we this Way of our own:Ne‚Äôer faileth the water, by dropping and dropping,To wear through a mountain of stone:For Hope, and Persistence, and Patience togetherAre watchwords in all kinds of weather;So, step after step ‚Äď such is ever the story-We‚Äôll come to the goal of our glory.

L.L. Zamenhof ‚ÄėLa Vojo‚Äô translated by D.O.S.Lowell, published in Star in a Night Sky. An Anthology of Esperanto Literature (London, 2012). YKL.2014.a.2549

Above: New edition of Edmond Privat, Vivo de Zamenhof (Rotterdam, 2007; YF.2013.a.18901), Below: new books about the life of Zamenhof (from France, Poland and Lithuania).

Olga Kerziouk, Curator, Esperanto studies

Posted by Olga Kerziouk at 11:00 AM

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Lidia Zamenhof (photo above from Wikimedia Commons) was a teacher, writer and translator and the youngest daughter of Ludwik Lejzer Zamenhof, the creator of the international auxiliary language Esperanto. She was born on 29 January 1904 in Warsaw, then in partitioned Poland, and later became an active promoter of both the Esperanto language and the Bah√°‚Äô√≠ Faith.

Her story is told in Wendy Heller‚Äôs biography Lidia: the Life of Lidia Zamenhof Daughter of Esperanto.

Cover of Lidia : the Life of Lidia Zamenhof, Daughter of Esperanto. (Oxford, 1985) X.950/44270

After completing her university studies in law in 1925, Lidia Zamenhof dedicated herself totally to working for Esperanto and the humanitarian ideals connected with it. In the same year, during the 17th World Esperanto Congress in Geneva in 1925, she became acquainted with the Bah√°‚Äô√≠ Faith of which she was soon to become an ardent promoter. Bah√°‚Äô√≠ is a relatively recent religion, founded in 19th-century Persia, which emphasizes the spiritual unity of the entire human race. Its founder, Bah√°‚Äôu‚Äôll√°h, taught that all religions come from the same divine source, and that the crucial need facing humanity is to find a unifying vision of the future of society, and of the nature and purpose of life.

As a professional Esperanto instructor Lidia Zamenhof made many promotional trips and taught over 50 Esperanto courses in various European countries using progressive, immersive teaching methods. In addition, she was a contributor to major Esperanto periodicals such as Literatura Mondo (ZF.9.b.266 ) and others. Her topics ranged from the teaching and promotion of Esperanto and the development of the Esperanto movement to studies on Polish literature and the teachings of the Bah√°‚Äô√≠ Faith. Her Esperanto translation of Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz was published in 1933. She also translated several volumes of Bah√°‚Äô√≠ writings, in particular John Ebenezer Esslemont‚Äôs Baha‚Äôu‚Äôllah and the New Era (London, 1923; 04504.g.27. ), considered the foremost introductory textbook to the religion, as Bah√°‚Äôu‚Äôll√°h kaj la Nova Epoko.

In 1937 Lidia travelled to the USA for a teaching tour jointly sponsored by the Esperanto Association of North America and the American Assembly of the Bah√°‚Äô√≠ Faith. She was forced to leave when her visa expired at the end of 1938, and ignoring the pleas of her friends she returned to Poland shortly before the start of the Second World War. Less than a month after the German invasion, the Zamenhof home in Warsaw was bombed; Lidia was arrested together with her brother Adam, his wife Wanda, and her sister Zofia. Adam Zamenhof was shot in January 1940 as one of 50 prisoners killed in retaliation for a Resistance assault on a Nazi officer, while Lidia, Zofia and Wanda were released from prison after five months and sent to live in the Warsaw Ghetto. There Lidia endeavoured to help others receive medicine and food. She was offered the chance to escape by Polish Esperantists as well as by a German Bah√°‚Äô√≠ soldier, but not wanting to endanger others she refused.

Her last known letter states: ‚ÄúDo not think of putting yourself in danger; I know that I must die but I feel it is my duty to stay with my people. God grant that out of our sufferings a better world may emerge. I believe in God. I am a Bah√°‚Äô√≠ and will die a Bah√°‚Äô√≠. Everything is in His hands.‚ÄĚ However, she died as a Jew, an Esperantist, and a member of the Zamenhof family. Hitler had made his opinion clear in Mein Kampf that Jews intended to use Esperanto to rule the world, and the head of the Gestapo in Warsaw received orders directly from Berlin that the Zamenhof family should be arrested.

The last that is known of Lidia is described by Esther Schor in her book Bridge of Words: Esperanto and the Dream of a Universal Language (New York, 2015; awaiting shelfmark).

Toward the end of September 1942, at the age of thirty-eight, she was among the 300,000 Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto who were packed into cattle cars and sent to Treblinka. (Zofia had gone voluntarily, perhaps thinking she could be of service as a medic.) Eva Toren, then a fourteen-year-old girl who had met and befriended Lidia that spring at a Ghetto seder, would survive to remember Lidia‚Äôs final hours in Warsaw. In 1993 Toren recalled the Nazis whipping, shouting, and pushing Jews into the Umschlagplatz, where they stood without water from early morning until evening. In the afternoon, the Germans and their Polish minions arranged the Jews in lines five deep for the selection. Lidia was several rows behind Eva, and they exchanged a pregnant glance. When she was selected for deportation, Lidia ‚Äúwalked regally, upright, with pride, unlike most of the other victims, who were understandably panicked.‚ÄĚ On the fifth of September, Lidia Zamenhof boarded the train to Treblinka, where, upon arriving, she was killed in the gas chamber.

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Can there be anyone in the world more harmless than an Esperanto enthusiast? Probably not. Speakers of the international language Esperanto are mainly interested in languages, foreign cultures and world peace. However, since the first book of Esperanto was published in 1887 they have lived through recurrent periods of intolerance and repression.

This is the subject of Ulrich Lins‚Äô book Dangerous Language whose new revised edition in Esperanto has just been published as La danńĚera lingvo ‚Äď Studo pri la persekutoj kontraŇ≠ Esperanto. This book has also been translated into German (1988), Italian (1990), Russian (1999), Lithuanian (2005) and Korean (2013), besides an earlier draft into Japanese in 1975, and will soon appear in English.

The last century was no less bloody and bellicose than earlier ones, but it was also the century of Esperanto, whose speakers represented an idealistic view that all peoples, languages and cultures were of equal value, a view apparently seldom shared by national leaders. From the earliest days of Esperanto, governments were quick to see potential dangers to their authority in the message spread by Esperanto.

As early as February 1895, when the language still had its base in the Russian Empire, the magazine La Esperantisto was blocked by the censor because it included an article by Leo Tolstoy, an enthusiastic supporter of Esperanto.

In Nazi Germany the authorities immediately understood that the internationalism, pacifism and equality which went hand in hand with Esperanto were the exact opposite of everything proclaimed by the Nazi ideal of a superior ‚ÄúAryan‚ÄĚ race destined to rule over other ‚ÄúUntermenschen‚ÄĚ (‚Äúsubhumans‚ÄĚ). Added to this, in Mein Kampf (Vol.1, Chap.XI) Hitler expressed his belief that Esperanto would be used by the Jews to achieve world domination. When the Jews were deported from Warsaw, the Gestapo received specific orders from Berlin to search for the descendants of Zamenhof (the creator of Esperanto). All three of his children died in the concentration camps. The only survivors were his daughter-in-law and her teenage son, Zamenhof's grandson, who still lives today in Paris.

In Japan, too, the imperial police force immediately recognized the progressive (and potentially communist) tendencies of the Esperanto movement. In the first decade of the 20th century the police began to take an interest in the relationship between anarchists and Esperantists, and in 1934 the Japanese Proletarian Esperantist Union was shut down.

It is harder to understand the reasoning behind the persecution of Esperanto speakers in the USSR under Stalin. Immediately after the Russian Revolution there was a flowering of languages in the new Soviet Union. New alphabets were created, all minority languages were recognized, and there was support for Esperanto.

However, in Stalin‚Äôs time Soviet society underwent a period of closing in on itself and suspecting everything which potentially had links with other countries. Esperantists were people who corresponded with foreigners, or at least were in a position to do so. As Sergej Kuznecov wrote in the afterword to the previous edition of La danńĚera lingvo, the treatment of Esperanto speakers can be seen as the measure of the totalitarianism of every regime. In the purges of the 1930s, many outstanding Esperantists perished even though they were sincere communists: Yevgeny Mikhalski, Vladimir Varankin, Ernest Drezen and others too numerous to list here.

Books by Drezen, Varankin and Mihalski from the British Library‚Äôs Esperanto collection.

La danńĚera lingvo describes in rather less detail the persecutions against Esperanto and its speakers in Spain, Portugal, Italy and other European regimes. Esperantists were even executed in those countries, most notably in Cordoba in Spain, when the Fascist army occupied the town in 1937 and shot all members of the local Esperanto group.

The difficulties in reviving Esperanto organizations after Stalin‚Äôs death are described in detail by Lins. The Association of Soviet Esperantists (ASE) was founded in 1979, but remained under strict government control for years. Even in some Western countries it was necessary to wait for the collapse of former regimes; the Portuguese association was only revived in 1972.

Memoirs about ASE and SEJM (Soviet Esperantist Youth Movement) by prominent Esperantists in the British Library‚Äôs collection.

In 2017 UNESCO will be commemorating the centenary of the death of Ludwik Lejzer Zamenhof. It is fitting that as that year approaches we should also remember the persecutions which have taken place against Esperanto and Esperanto speakers over the past century.

It is surprising now to realise that Zamenhof‚Äôs concerns were not primarily linguistic. He was far more interested in bringing an end to wars between different peoples, and in creating conditions for international understanding and peace. He lived through a period of pogroms and major wars in Europe, and it is not by chance that the present period of increasing xenophobia and intolerance in many parts of Europe and the world reminds us of events in Zamenhof‚Äôs lifetime. This shows yet again that the road leading towards progress and civilization is neither straight nor easy, but Esperanto remains a tool of vital importance in making Zamenhof's vision of world peace and mutual understanding a reality.

Renato Corsetti, Professor Emeritus of Psycholinguistics, La Sapienza University Rome, former president of the World Esperanto Association, General Secretary of the Academy of Esperanto.

Further reading

GarviŐĀa Soto, Roberto. Esperanto and its rivals : the struggle for an international language. (Philadelphia, [2015]) m15/.11262

Richardson, David. Learning and Using the International Language. (Washington, 2004). YD.2007.a.8182

Posted by Olga Kerziouk at 10:00 AM

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In the summer of 1887, Lazar Ludwik Zamenhof published a 40-page brochure in Russian entitled Mezhdunarodnyi iazyk: predislovie i polnyi uchebnik (‚ÄėInternational Language. Foreword and Complete Textbook‚Äô), under the pseudonym Dr. Esperanto, meaning ‚ÄúOne Who Hopes‚ÄĚ in his new language. Soon ‚ÄúDr. Esperanto‚Äôs language‚ÄĚ became known simply as ‚ÄúEsperanto‚ÄĚ. This obscure, self-published booklet by an unknown author achieved a remarkable success in a surprisingly short period of time. Over the next three years it was translated into Polish, French, German, Hebrew, English, Swedish and Yiddish, and very quickly Zamenhof began to receive letters from enthusiasts written in the new language. In 1888 he published a second book with further discussion of his language project and a number of short reading passages.

Literary translations, as well as original poetry, played an important role in Esperanto from the start. What better way for the author to test the limits of his new language, and to develop it where it was found lacking? But in addition, Zamenhof wanted to prove that Esperanto was not merely a convenient tool for business and tourism, but a complete language capable of translating the most exalted masterpieces of world literature. In his first two booklets he concentrated on short and relatively simple texts: the Lord‚Äôs Prayer, a passage from Genesis, proverbs, a fairy tale by Hans Andersen, a short poem by Heine.

In the literary traditions that Zamenhof knew best ‚Äď Russian and German ‚Äď Shakespeare was a dominating presence. His works were admired by Pushkin and Turgenev, Goethe and Schiller, and in 1875-77 three volumes of Shakespeare‚Äôs complete plays appeared in Polish translation, edited by J√≥zef Ignacy Kraszewski . Zamenhof may also have seen Polish performances of Hamlet in Warsaw, where he lived as a student and later as a struggling ophthalmologist.

Humphrey Tonkin, in his essay ‚ÄúHamlet in Esperanto‚ÄĚ (2006) points out that: ‚ÄúShakespeare and Shakespeare translation played a special part in the national revivals of the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries: for several languages of central Europe, translations of his plays marked their emergence as fully credentialed literary languages ‚Äď Macbeth in Czech (1786), Hamlet in Hungarian (1790), for example.‚ÄĚ Under these circumstances, it was inevitable that Zamenhof should feel his new language could not be considered fully mature until it had shown itself capable of translating the complex language of Shakespeare. Hamleto, reńĚido de Danujo came out only seven years after the publication of Zamenhof‚Äôs first brochure ‚Äď no longer at his own expense, but as No. 71 in the series ‚ÄúBiblioteko de la lingvo internacia Esperanto‚ÄĚ, printed by W. T√ľmmel in Nuremberg. The second edition, in 1902, was brought out by the prestigious French publishing house Hachette.

‚ÄúAs early as 1894, Zamenhof published a complete translation of Hamlet,‚ÄĚ writes the Esperanto poet William Auld in the journal Monda Kulturo. ‚ÄúIt was his first extensive literary translation and among other things it served to prove incontestably the elasticity and power of expression of this merely seven-year-old language. It rooted the iambic pentameter firmly in Esperanto, and established criteria allowing us to measure and assess the success and poetic qualities of all subsequent translations.‚ÄĚ

In her biography Zamenhof, creator of Esperanto (London, 1960; 10667.m.13.), Marjorie Boulton points out that Esperanto was already sufficiently developed to rise to the challenge of translating Shakespeare‚Äôs work without the need to coin a significant amount of new vocabulary for the purpose. Zamenhof‚Äôs Hamlet according to Boulton is ‚Äúperhaps competent rather than brilliant, but it is a good translation ‚Äď readable, speakable, actable, generally a fair rendering of the original.‚ÄĚ Seventy years later, L. N. M. Newell (1902-1968) made a new translation of the play. His Hamleto, princo de Danujo, published in 1964, is more faithful to the original, but less successful at reproducing the spirit of the work. As Tonkin says in his essay, ‚ÄúNewell is for reading, Zamenhof is for acting.‚ÄĚ

Zamenhof‚Äôs translation of Hamlet was only the first of many translations which were to follow. 21 out of Shakespeare‚Äôs 38 plays have been translated into Esperanto over the decades, some of them more than once, while his complete Sonnets were translated by William Auld, one of Esperanto‚Äôs most outstanding original poets, besides being a prolific translator, essayist, and candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature.

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On 26 July 1887 the censor‚Äôs office in Warsaw approved the publication of a booklet with the title Mezhdunarodnyi iazyk. Predislovie i polnyi uchebnik, translated into English in 1888 as Dr. Esperanto‚Äôs International Tongue. Preface and Complete Method (British Library 12902.aa.55.(1.)). Since then Esperanto speakers throughout the world have celebrated 26 July as Esperanto Day. The slogan on this year‚Äôs posters is Fair Communication. The marriage between Esperanto and Fair Communication has now lasted for over a century.

Fair Communication Poster for 2016 (Designed by Peter Oliver)

Many people over the centuries have attempted to create their own language, but their reasons for doing so have not always been the same. In the Middle Ages the motive was religious. The 11th-century abbess Hildegard of Bingen invented her Ignota Lingua to speak with the angels. After the Renaissance, the motive was more likely to be philosophical. A typical example was the language created by Francis Lodwick. In 1652 he published his work The Ground-Work, Or Foundation Laid, (or so intended) For the Framing of a New Perfect Language: And an Vniversall or Common Writing. And presented to the consideration of the Learned.

The beginning of Francis Lodwick‚Äôs, The Ground-Work‚Ä¶ (London, 1652). 623.g.4.(1.)

At the time of the French Revolution the emphasis was more on languages with a practical application, and that tendency increased during the 19th century, when inventions such as the steam train and the telegraph led to an explosion in fast travel and new ways of communicating. To all this Ludwik Lejzer Zamenhof, the author of the 1887 booklet, added a social dimension. As a Jew he had experienced ethnic struggles and violence in his native city of BiaŇāystok: pogroms by Russians against the Jews, rebellions by Poles against the Russians, nationalistic self-assertion by the Germans and so forth. What a wonderful thing it would be, thought the teenage Zamenhof, if all men could be brothers and stop killing one another! A na√Įve hope of course, but if you were living now in Syria or Congo, probably that would be your greatest desire as well.

At all events, the ideals of the brotherhood of peoples and a just form of communication survived throughout the last century and are still relevant today. Naturally these ideals have been promoted by Esperanto speakers, but also by others. Let‚Äôs take a look at several books published in recent years.

In 1996 Esperanto speakers in collaboration with other organizations inaugurated a series of symposia named after Inazo Nitobe, one of the Under-Secretaries General of the League of Nations in the 1920s, who proposed that the use of Esperanto should be debated in the General Assembly. His proposal was vetoed by France, who at that time considered itself to be the keeper of the world‚Äôs international language. The Nitobe Symposia are outstanding occasions for a meeting between linguists, communications experts, and high-ranking politicians, who have various approaches to the language problem in international organizations and in international life in general. Participants in the first symposia (Prague, 1996), included linguists and translators alongside representatives of the EU, UNESCO and the UN. The proceedings were published under the title: Towards linguistic democracy: proceedings of the Nitobe Symposium of International Organizations, ed. Mark Fettes and Suzanne Bolduc (Rotterdam, 1998; YF.2006.a.31177). The main topic in all contributions was linguistic democracy, not only between nations but also within nations. At that time the struggle of national minorities was a very pressing issue.

Proceedings of the Nitobe Symposia in British Library's Collections

The same topics came up again in the following symposia. For example, the third symposium was entitled: Towards a new international language order (proceedings, edited by Lee Chong-Yeong and Liu Haitao, published Rotterdam, 2004; YF.2006.a.31175). Since the symposium was held in Beijing, and since the Chinese participants tended to emphasise China‚Äôs new role as a major power, speakers at the seminar were more interested in international relations rather than linguistic democracy within countries.

An important contributor to these seminars was Robert Phillipson, joint winner of the Linguapax Prize in 2010, and well known as an advocate for linguistic democracy. His book Linguistic Imperialism (Oxford, 1992; 93/06193) received numerous undeserved criticisms from defenders of the status quo. His second book English-Only Europe? Challenging Language Policy (London, 2003; YC.2007.a.282) was translated into Esperanto with the title ńąu nur-angla EŇ≠ropo? Defio al lingva politiko (Rotterdam, 2004; YF.2006.a.29602; photo below). For years his arguments have been debated in Europe, but his observations have made little headway among European politicians, who prefer to listen to his opponent Philippe Van Parijs. In his book Linguistic Justice for Europe and for the World, (Oxford, 2011; YC.2012.a.10920), Van Parijs prefers to support the use of English at the international level with a tax for those who profit from its use. Van Parijs has been another participant at the Nitobe symposia.

Italians such as Andrea Chiti Batelli, for many years an important functionary at the European Parliament, have taken the lead in the struggle to restore the standing of the traditional Greek-Latin-Romance culture within Europe. He wrote the booklet Politika hegemonio kaj lingva hegemonio en EŇ≠ropo (Rotterdam, 1995; YF.2006.a.29616) together with Pierre Janton.

For Esperanto speakers, 26 July is the occasion for reflecting on these events.

Renato Corsetti (Professor Emeritus of Psycholinguistics at La Sapienza University in Rome, former president of the World Esperanto Association, General Secretary of the Academy of Esperanto.)